


please don't say you love me

by pallasjoanna



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M, Gen, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, Texting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-18
Updated: 2015-11-01
Packaged: 2018-04-26 23:43:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5025301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pallasjoanna/pseuds/pallasjoanna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adrien and Marinette find out that they now have a chat app for them to communicate even when they're out of costume. Adrien is ecstatic. Marinette... not as much. And everything goes downhill (uphill?) from there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Welcome back, Marinette,” her mother says as Marinette skips into the shop and kisses her on the cheek. Her mother says something else, probably a teasing question to the weird look on her face (does she have a weird look on her face? _Please, please, I hope Adrien didn’t catch that—_ ), and she nearly trips on the stairs when she replies, “Yeah, love you too, Mom!”

She can feel Tikki laughing in her purse.

Maybe she should call Alya. Or wait, maybe later when she’s calmed down enough because screaming incoherently with her best friend won’t do any favors for her phone bill. But her hand finds her phone anyway.

She closes the door to her room and lets Tikki out before she flops into her bed, wiggling into a comfortable position. The screen seems to be taunting her since it takes forever for Alya to pick up her call. Five seconds, ten seconds—

_“The number you are calling is currently not available. Please try again later.”_

“Argh! And I was so ready to tell her everything that happened, Tikki,” Marinette groans. She places her phone on the bedside table. “All about what happened today, and Adrien—“

Adrien. The very thought of him makes her face heat up, and she has to bury her face in her pillow to muffle her giggles.

* * *

 

All in all, it would have been a fairly uneventful day, even with the expectation that they would be doing gymnastics in gym class. Rolls and backbends aren’t new to Marinette. Multiple flips and cartwheels are easier to pull off when she transforms, but those aren’t anything she can’t handle. While the rest of the class were assigned to practicing basic stretches, she found herself grouped with the more experienced classmates, including Vera, an actual gymnast and an older student, Chloe, and Adrien.

“Why don’t you try something?” Vera suggested to them after demonstrating a cartwheel, somersault, and a dive roll in a series. “If you can, of course. Don’t want to get a sprained wrist. Or ankle. Those hurt a lot.”

Despite Vera’s warning of sprained limbs, Marinette saw Adrien seeming to consider it. Maybe she would have to add a new talent to Adrien’s ever-growing list by the end of the day. Or maybe—

She cleared her throat. “Can I?”

“You?!” Chloe snickered. She looped an arm around the crook of Adrien’s elbow. “Maybe we should call the nurse already?”

Her hands clenched into fists at her sides. Several months of Chloe should have made her used to it already— _wait, no, that’s horrible_. If Alya were here, she could at least give her some extra courage. _Come on, Marinette_ , she scolded herself. _You can’t let her get to you._

“We should at least let Marinette show us what she can do,” Adrien replied, turning to her with an expectant look in his green eyes.

She wasn’t even going to pretend that didn’t give her some butterflies in her stomach. “Haha, yeah, but you know, it’s not much—I mean, I can do some of what Vera did without dying—“ His eyes widened at that, and she had to backtrack. “I mean, I can do some of what Vera did, but obviously I’m not as good as her, and I’mjustgoingtoshutupanddoitnow.”

And she turned and marched to the mat before she could embarrass herself any further.

But after taking a deep breath and giving herself a running start, she found that her heart didn’t hammer so loud in her chest already, nor was she aware of everyone’s eyes upon her.

One breath, and she brought her hands down for a cartwheel. Her feet touched the mat, another breath, and she sprung for a backward flip. Then a somersault. And she loved the sense of weightlessness, and the feeling of being above the ground yet landing so surely on it. Doing it in the school gym didn’t have quite the same rush of her vaulting over the rooftops of Paris with Chat Noir—but like she said, she loved it.

She finished with a roll, and in the instant before she was about to get up, she saw Adrien right in front of her, and with a flail that really wouldn’t score her any points on the floor, she tried to stop herself from barreling into him. It just made sure that she overbalanced and really was going to fall on him and she had to squeeze her eyes shut for the inevitable.

For someone who held dominion over good luck, hers really wasn’t in her favor right now.

But two warm hands caught her arms just as she found her footing. Marinette opened her eyes and found herself looking up at Adrien, his mouth set in a wide grin.

Her breath caught. She couldn’t recall a time when he smiled that wide, and she always, always paid close attention.

“Whoa there,” he said. And she could feel the gust of an exhale as he chuckled. “Are you okay?”

She might just spontaneously combust from this. “Uh. Um. Yeah.”

“That’s the most awesome thing I’ve ever seen,” he added, and his eyes just sparkled. He called her awesome. She can now go to heaven happy.

“Really? I-it was nothing,” she said lamely. She made to straighten herself as Vera ran to them, and Adrien seemed to remember that he was still holding her arms.

“You’re alright? No sprains or broken noses?” Vera had a panicked look on her face, and Marinette had to assure her that, no, she was fine, Adrien caught her, and no, she was not definitely suffering from a fever. Or a concussion. What in the world gave her that idea?

And nothing, not even Chloe, could wipe her grin for the rest of the period.

* * *

 

“Hello? Earth to Marinette?” Something small pokes at her cheek, pulling her out of her reverie, and Tikki pops up in her field of vision when she turns her head.

“Huh? Sorry, Tikki. What were you saying?”

Tikki smiles in that knowing way of hers. “I was saying that Alya might still be at her club meeting, so there’s nothing for you to worry about.”

“Yeah.” With Founder’s week already a couple of months away, the journalism club is bound to be busy, along with the rest of the school. Marinette would be busy along with her if she committed to a club, but with being Ladybug, she can’t spare the time.

Tikki hovers above her phone. “And you should probably take a look at something.”

“Is it bad?” She swipes her passcode, expecting something like—actually, she doesn’t know what to expect. But there’s no new message or a missed call. “What should I be looking for?”

“It should be somewhere there, ah, that’s the one!” Tikki points to a ladybug icon on the screen, which already has one notification. Which is really weird, since Marinette doesn’t remember even downloading this app.

“Tikki, what—“

And Tikki plops herself down onto the screen.

Whatever it’s going to display first takes her to a loading screen that mimics the countdown of her Miracle Stone when she transforms into Ladybug, and the first thought—well, the first dozen thoughts that run through her head all involve someone somehow knowing who Ladybug is.

Who Marinette is.

Something must have shown on her face because Tikki immediately says, “Oh no, it’s nothing like that, silly.”

“Then—“ The loading screen disappears, and finally takes her to a chat screen.

A _chat screen_. With a ladybug-patterned wallpaper.

And by the time her eyes travel down, she has a feeling she knows whose message it’s going to be.

 

Chat Noir

How are you on this beautiful day, my lady?

Sent 7:56

 

“Where did he get that winking cat emoji?” Marinette asks out loud, already scrolling through the gallery (all of her emojis are ladybugs. Of course.) and wait, this really shouldn’t be her first concern. “Tikki, why do I have a Chat Noir chat app on my phone?”

“It’s more of a chat app for those who hold Miracle Stones. The only Miracle Stone wielder you’ve met so far is Chat Noir, so he’s the only one you can communicate through this right now.” Tikki looks up at her with wide eyes. “The first communicator Ladybug ever had used enchanted tablets with hieroglyphs, and it was only last century that it started to look like a phone. It’s incredible that the magic decided to adapt in this way.”

Tikki has a note of awe in her voice, and she buzzes around excitedly.

As for Marinette, she doesn’t really know how to feel about that.

“Do you like it?” Tikki still has the bug version of the puppy eyes, and she doesn’t really have the heart to voice the nervous tangle of uncertainty at the pit of her stomach.

“It would be useful for communicating when we haven’t transformed,” she says at least. Upon closer inspection, every feature it has really resembles an ordinary chat app. If Alya or her parents ever see her using it though, how is she going to explain that away? “And of course, the cat just had to find out first.”

Well, she isn’t going to let him have the monopoly on their chat. She sends him a quick message before attacking her homework.

And before she decides against it, she adds a ladybug emoji for good measure.

* * *

 

Adrien is still groggy when he wakes up from his nap. Gym class and fencing on the same day takes a lot out of him, and combined with the nightly patrol, tends to leave him really sleepy for the next.

“How long was I asleep, Plagg?” he mumbles around a yawn. He stretches, working out the kinks in his shoulders as he looks out the window. And then down to the cheese platter he laid out for Plagg. It must be around dinner now.

“Two hours.” At least, that’s what he thinks Plagg is saying as he wolfs down the last of the camembert.

He grimaces. Two hours. He can do all of his homework in an hour and a half if he hurries through dinner, and he should still have some time left over before he’ll meet with Ladybug.

A mirror near his bed helpfully shows him his disheveled state, and he swipes the drool off his chin with a towel. He piles all the books he needs on his study table, and—“Plagg? Have you seen my phone?”

“Probably in your bag again.” Plagg snickers, and Adrien fights against the urge to roll his eyes.

“Very funny.” His phone happens to be under the cheese platter, and he grips it tightly as he scrolls through his messages. There’s some from Nino, Chloe, one from Natalie about a photoshoot the day after tomorrow—

And his heart skips when he sees a ladybug icon on his notifications bar.

Discovering the chat app early that morning was a better wake-me-up than coffee. He happened to spot an app with his Miracle Stone pattern as the icon, and Plagg’s explanation only made sure he couldn’t fall asleep for the rest of the day.

“Ah, that? Should help you talk with Ladybug even when you’re both out of costume,” he said.

And he couldn’t think of anything else throughout breakfast. Natalie kept asking about whether the food was bad or if he was sick. He deflected her questions by saying something about how he ate too much last night, and while he was picking at his omelet, he tried to compose his first ever text message to Ladybug.

A ‘hello’ or ‘good morning’ didn’t seem enough because how could he cram everything he feels into a simple greeting. But then if he did that, he might as well just confess his love for her, and no, he doesn’t have the guts to do that right now. Plus, it’s not the ‘first message’ kind of material.

He had to be overthinking it. What would Chat Noir say? Chat Noir would say something flirty, and then send one of the cute cat emojis he saw earlier. That wasn’t something he’d send for a first message though. In the end, he decided on some middle ground and included the emoji.

Still, he probably wasn’t breathing when he hit ‘send’.

And he probably isn’t breathing right now as the loading screen disappears.

 

Ladybug

Really great thanks for asking

Having a patrol at 9. Think you can make it?

Sent 16:25

 

(He can’t stop grinning at the cute ladybug smiley she sends along with her message.)

Okay, so she doesn’t think he’s being weird. He sighs in relief. He’s about to send a reply when someone knocks at his door.

Plagg quickly zips back into his bag.

“Yeah?” Adrien opens the door to find Natalie, as severe-looking as ever.

Natalie blinks at him. “Ah, good to see you finally awake. Dinner is ready. And—“ She looks at him with a critical eye that makes him pat his bedhead down nervously. “Are you sure you’re quite well? You said that you’re fine this morning, but if you really aren’t, then your father will insist—“

“No, it’s okay,” he blurts out in a manner that doesn’t seem to help his case, judging by the way Natalie’s eyebrows are rising up. “I’m fine, really. I just got excited for—“ He tries to think of an excuse. “—gymnastics today. If I’m not feeling well, I will let you know right away, Natalie.”

“If you say so,” Natalie assents, but he gets the feeling that he hasn’t really convinced her.

“And I’ll be down for dinner in a while.”

“Of course.”

“Really, kid? Gymnastics?” Plagg just about howls with laughter when he closes the door. “You’re going to need a lot more practice if you want to convince anyone with that.”

“It’s not exactly a lie,” he retorts. He was looking forward to gymnastics, but that wasn’t the reason he acted like a kid on a sugar rush this morning. According to Plagg, at least.

But anyway, back to his reply.

He types slowly, careful not to leave a funny typo even for just a short message, and if he leaves the room with a skip in his step, well, that should convince Natalie that he’s perfectly fine.

 

Chat Noir

Wouldn’t miss it for the world.

Sent 19:42


	2. Chapter 2

[Read previous messages]

Ladybug

_hey_

_you’re fine right?_

Sent 06:01

\--

Chat Noir

_Of course I always am. Have you seen me?_

Sent 07:05

\--

Ladybug

_that last giant paintball looked like it hurt_

_oh_

_okay_

_you’re joking_

Sent 07:12

\--

Chat Noir

_You wound me, my lady._

_[sad cat emoji]_

Sent 07:13

\--

Ladybug

_not that. you look fine enough to me but_

_wait_

Sent 07:15

\--

Chat Noir

_Oh_

_[grinning cat emoji]_

_You don’t have to deny it, you know._

_I AM the cutest cat around._

Sent 07:16

\--

Despite the utter ridiculousness of it, she can’t help but smile through a yawn. She continues walking along the hallway to her classroom, already composing a reply in her head that is more or less composed of ‘ _yeah, you’re cute, and you’re the only akuma-beating catboy in Paris, but you’ll never be as cute as Adrien._ ’ Minus the last part. Or maybe something less likely to inflate Chat’s head. She’s about to type it out when someone nudges her shoulder.

“Marinette!”

Oh god.

She mashes the home button for all its worth and turns to Alya with her phone and crossed fingers at her back. “Morning, Alya!” Her laugh is definitely not nervous. “You’re a bit early today.”

“Did you sleep late again?” Alya leans forward, squinting at something on her face. Marinette just hopes she can’t see the signs of _‘your best friend is doing something shifty.’_

But Alya doesn’t seem interested in any hypothetical secret texting because her face softens and the next words that come out of her mouth are: “Let me guess. Trig homework?”

It’s not wrong. Marinette nods right away. “Right. Yeah. Trig homework.”

She had finished most of her homework early in the evening, but of course trigonometry just had to be longer and more difficult than the rest, making her miss her usual nap before the nightly patrol. In fact, she was planning to excuse herself last night, if it weren’t for Chat texting her about some giant paint war in the middle of the city which somehow involved a sibling rivalry.

Just normal teenager problems.

“I know something that can cheer you up. So,” Alya does something that can only be described as waggling her eyebrows. Marinette snorts. “What are you gonna do about Adrien?”

Maybe Marinette is missing something here. Maybe it’s the sleep deprivation. But the mention of his name does make her a bit more awake. “Who’s doing what to Adrien?”

“I mean, it’s been forever since your gym class moment—“

“That was two days ago!“ And it still makes her want to giggle or scream into the nearest available pillow whenever she thinks about it. Which is a lot really.

“Exactly.” Alya pumps her fist in the air. “You have to keep your streak up, or else—“ She jabs a finger in her direction. “He’s going to forget about it. And you don’t want that to happen, do you?”

“ _No._ ”

Everyone in the corridor turns to look at her. It takes her a second to realize that she actually yelled it out loud. She starts walking a bit faster out of the area. “No,” she repeats, this time in a smaller voice. “But, o wise Alya, do you have any advice for me?”

“Since you asked.” Alya gestures to the open door of their classroom with a flourish. “Talk to him.”

She scoffs. “That’s all? I do that all the time.”

“Without stuttering?”

“Hey!” That’s just—of course she’s managed that already.

Maybe a few times.

At least once.

Alya smirks.

“He has very nice eyes,” Marinette says defensively.

Alya just rolls hers in response. “Come on, I know you can do it. And even if you mess up— _which you won’t,_ we’ll visit the crepe shop after class. My treat.”

“When you put it that way,” Marinette says, “how can I say no?” Crepes are always a nice incentive, although with her record with this kind of thing so far, Alya may be making good on her treat soon enough. She doesn’t put it past the universe to make her fall flat on her face when she talks to Adrien, like the way Chat does a lot when around her.

Oh yeah, Chat—

“Give me a sec,” she says, and before Alya can protest, she angles her body against the wall and types out a reply to her partner.

\--

Ladybug

_don’t let it go to your head_

_haha_

_nevermind you’re clearly okay_

Sent 07:53

\--

Alya lets her go in first, and by ‘let’, she means ‘gives her a friendly shove into the classroom.’ The air is filled with the usual pre-homeroom chatter which would make her feel at home on any other day but now makes her feel like everyone is watching her.

At least Chloe is talking to Sabrina right now. Score one for her luck.

“Hi Nino!” she says first when she walks over to his and Adrien’s desk.

Nino looks up at her from his bubbles. “Hey, Marinette!” He also waves to Alya. “Yo!”

As for Adrien, his head is resting against his desk, and with a thermos that most likely contains coffee right beside him, Marinette almost thinks he’s asleep. She shoots a questioning look towards Nino, to which he shakes his head. Awake then. Maybe he’s reading something underneath his desk?

She looks back at Alya who flashes her a thumbs up.

Here goes. “Hi Adrien!”

Adrien immediately sits up, and his phone slips out of his hand which he manages to catch before it falls to the floor. “Oh, er, hi Marinette!”

His cheeks are red, and he looks so flustered and _handsome_ that she wants to scream. The way his mouth is twitching like he’s trying to suppress the smile on his face does nothing to help.

Now, Marinette knows Adrien is of the more chipper people in the mornings, even with dark circles under his eyes and while running on coffee. But he’s been smiling a lot lately. (Not that she wants him to stop—what she wants is on the opposite end of stopping.)

She looks at his phone.

“Did you get some good news?” she asks, and she’s proud at how she managed to get a full sentence out. Take that, Alya!

“Something like that, yeah,” Adrien says, rubbing the back of his neck. “Why do you ask? I look really weird right now, don’t I?”

Marinette wasn’t kidding to Alya about Adrien’s eyes. Aside from their lovely shade of green, her meeting his eyes just has a tendency to make her mouth go dry and to make her brain go on strike.

And now, with her brain-to-mouth filter completely shot to pieces, she finds herself blurting out, “I think you’re really cute when you’re happy!”

Oh holy crap.

Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Nino with his mouth hanging open, Alya with hands over her own, Chloe somehow looking confused and indignant, and every classmate of theirs who heard her watching them. Adrien looks like she whacked him with a stick between his eyes—which Marinette might as well have done.

“Good morning class!” Their teacher enters with absolutely perfect timing. “Everyone please— hmm? Did something happen?”

Marinette just sits down.

* * *

Ladybug

_how do you do it???_

Sent 11:52

\--

Chat Noir

_Do what?_

Sent 11:55

\--

Ladybug

_the thing you always do. flirting_

Sent 11:56

\--

Chat Noir

_Do you want tips?_

_But you don’t need to flirt with me, my lady._

_Your lovely smile is all I need._

_[winking cat emoji]_

Sent 12:01

\--

The photographer is less than pleased when Adrien shows up for the shoot, but at least she keeps her comments out of Natalie’s hearing range (which is an impressive achievement by itself). It isn’t the first time he’s had to show up while sleep-deprived due to an akuma attack, but that’s what makeup is for.

It’s lunch break when he makes it to school the next morning due to even another photoshoot. The hallways are almost empty as he walks to the classroom. He already texted Nino and Chloe not to wait up for him, and as expected, the classroom is empty when he gets there.

The notes of that day’s French lecture are still scrawled on the board which he decides to take a picture of, though he starts regretting his decision when he starts fidgeting about five minutes in. It’s depressingly quiet. He doesn’t have homework to do, and it has to be a bad day when he’s thinking of doing homework to rescue himself from boredom. He’s thinking of letting Plagg out of the bag—he snorts at his own joke—but someone may walk in. Plagg should be happy enough with his cheese for now.

His hand finds his phone again, hoping for a new message from Ladybug, although he does have to remind himself that checking the app for new messages every few minutes won’t make it more likely for her to send him one. Ladybug did message him around this hour before.  It makes him wonder if they share the same lunch break.

Another five minutes, and he’s about to let Plagg out for a game of ‘Don’t Victimize the Camembert-Shaped Objects’ when Marinette and Vera, come into the room, with the former holding a binder with pieces of rolled up masking tape and the latter holding a stack of papers.

“Which one does our class get again?” Marinette asks, and Adrien can pinpoint the exact second she sees him. Because her face turns into a very obvious shade of red and she jumps behind Vera.

So she hasn’t forgotten yesterday too.

Vera is looking very much like she wants to know that short story. He clears his throat and goes over to them. “What are those for?” he asks, pointing to the stacks of paper.

“Oh, these are for Founder’s Week. Sign-up sheets for events and committees,” Vera says as she pastes one onto the side of the board. Marinette gives up hiding behind her and starts detaching tape from the binder to hand to Vera. “If you join one, you get extra points in gym class.”

“Just gym?”

Vera laughs. “Believe me, us seniors keep trying to negotiate about that.”

When Vera moves away to the other side of the board, Marinette follows her.

The resulting awkward silence weighs heavily in the air. He starts fidgeting again. Should he talk? He should, but what would he say anyway? He doubts “Don’t worry, you won’t believe half the things I say” would go over so well with her. Homeschool didn’t prepare him for this.

He tries though. “So, what’s Founder’s week like?” he asks, hoping he can prompt Marinette into talking to him.

Unfortunately, Vera does not get the hint. “Right. You’re new. There’s lots of shops on the grounds during the week, and the sports events are just brutal—we’re about to graduate, so—and we have Mr. and Ms. Francoise on the last day. And the concert. I think your year’s doing the decorations for it.”

“Sounds fun.” At this point, he settles on thinking ‘ _please say something_ ’ on repeat towards Marinette.

Alas, mental telepathy works about as well as Hawk Moth trying to get their Miraculous Stones so far, with her putting in a lot of effort into pasting bits of tape on the backs of the sheets. Adrien sighs and decides to stare at the board instead.

Fencing, track, banner-making, a singing contest—and his eyes linger on the sheet for dancesport for a bit longer than the rest. Saving the world doesn’t wait for dance practice sessions though, so he moves on. He finds the one Vera talked about, the concert design committee, at the bottom.

One, Adrien doesn’t have the talent for this. But two, he can help out in pushing and pasting stuff, and three, why not?  It should be fun. He leans over and fishes his pen from his pocket—

“You’re joining?” Marinette squeaks.

Adrien blinks at his accidental success.

Marinette laughs nervously when he looks at her. “Of course you are. You’re writing your name there. Don’t mind me.”

“Wait, aren’t you—“ He straightens up and gestures to the sign-up sheet. “Aren’t you going to join? You’re good at designing.”

The red that hasn’t completely faded from her face since she entered the classroom returns in full force. “Really? Thanks—I—I mean, I’ll think about it. Later. After I’m done with this.” She hugs the binder like a shield and spins to Vera. “Are there still classrooms left?”

Now that Adrien looks at their senior, he notices Vera is leaning against the far wall and probably has been for a while. The grin gives it away. He ends up turning towards the board again, taking his time to write his name and feeling self-conscious for some reason.

“Just a few more,” Vera says. “Still coming with me, Marinette?”

“Sure, so, um—“

Adrien looks back up when he realizes Marinette is talking to him.

“I’ll see you around?” she says.

“In about thirty minutes?” he quips.

That gets a shy smile out of her. She follows Vera out of the room.

With them gone, he finds himself at a loss on what to do once more. He’s already scanned all the possible events on the board, so maybe he could go down to the cafeteria instead? But a quick look at his watch tells him that Nino may be going back to the classroom anyway. He is staring at his desk—Plagg and French notes it is—when a loud set of footsteps echoes in the corridor outside.

Marinette peeks around the door.

“Could you write my name on the concert design committee, too?”

“Sure—“

“If it’s not too much trouble—“

“It’s not.” He probably being a bad sport when he finds himself smirking at her. “Just that?”

She nods. “Yeah. Okaythanksbye!”

And with that, she’s off again.

Just when he finishes writing her name below his— _Marinette Dupain-Cheng_ , and he’s proud at how he’s managed to remember most of his classmates’ family names already—his phone vibrates in his pocket. His heart skips a beat when he sees a ladybug icon.

\--

Ladybug

_akuma at the seine!!!_

Sent 12:18

\--

“Now?” Adrien groans. At the akuma, not at Ladybug because while he won’t pass up a chance to see her again, he doesn’t really want their dates to be mildly life-threatening all the time. “Plagg, we have to go,” he says as he unzips his bag.

Plagg takes a deep gulp of air. “About time! I was dying in there!” He looks around. “You’re not planning to transform here, are you?”

“Nope.” He holds Plagg in his hands as he runs out the door, and—wait, he can’t leave his bag, so he goes back in to grab it and drop it off at his fencing club locker later. Hopefully, the broom closet he uses for this situation is vacant this time around.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just laying down the plot first with some awkward dorks. and yes! finally, an action-y chapter for the next!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this chapter after episode 9, and it sort of like, ran away from me?  
> Anyway, the difficulty of writing a multi-chapter fanfic mid-season is that inevitably, I'm going to have to acknowledge the events in some coming episodes in the story. It's not yet important, but just assume episode 9 has happened.  
> Also, the OCs will be relevant later, and I don't have Adrien's level of puns.

Well.

That could’ve been worse.

“Not really,” Vera says beside her, and when Marinette looks up at her, her face is turned away to hide her laughter. Not that Vera is even trying.

In her defense, Marinette was planning to join the design committee long before Adrien even wrote his name there, but a combination of lingering embarrassment from yesterday and the fact that _it’s Adrien_ made her tongue-tied enough to decide not to put her name there. Besides, what if he thought that she was stalking him or something? Granted, he’s too nice to even think that, but still.

“Aren’t seniors supposed to be supportive?” Marinette grumbles, clapping a hand over her still-warm cheek. She hides behind the binder—the world really does not need more of her tomato-colored face—and something sticky clings to her forehead and hair.

Vera giggles, the kind that make Marinette sincerely worried for the whole _terminale_ batch. “When you’re like us, someone is going to ask you the same—“ she trails off, and Marinette hurriedly pulls  the tape off her face before looking at whatever caught Vera’s attention.

A tall gangly boy is sprinting down the corridor, almost running into a few students. “Blaise!” Vera calls after him.

 He skids to a stop beside them. “Vera, I—“ Marinette squints at him—she swears she’s seen him before. “Have you heard? About the incident at the Seine?”

_That_ catches Marinette’s attention, and Tikki’s too, if her twitching purse is any indication. “What happened?” she demands.

Blaise blinks, seeming to have noticed her just now.

“This is Marinette. Marinette, Blaise, student council president and all that,” Vera says, and oh, so that’s why he seems so familiar to Marinette.

“Right.” He nods. “I’m not really sure about what happened. I just heard about it, and I have to go ask the faculty—but they say it’s all over Facebook now—“

Marinette’s heard enough. She shoves the binder into Blaise’s hands, and turns to Vera. “Sorry, I know I said I’ll help, but I just remembered I left something in the classroom, and I really need it, so don’t wait up for me,” she blurts out at Vera’s dumbfounded face and starts running.

She’s about to elbow past a few students when Vera yells, “Marinette!”

She decides to look back.

Vera waves at her. “Your classroom’s the other way!”

 Oh. Right. Why, why her brain decide to use that excuse? With a sheepish smile, she runs back toward her classroom, stopping just outside the door.

Now what?

Tikki peeks out of her purse. “We better hurry, Marinette.”

“Just a sec,” she says, glancing back at the corridor. Blaise and Vera are still talking outside the other classroom. The crowd isn’t thick enough for her to go past them unnoticed, and Vera even glances back in her direction. _Please go in_ , she thinks at them.

Several seconds pass with no such luck. On a whim, Marinette decides to peek past the door of her classroom. It’s still just Adrien there by the board, at first staring at his desk as if thinking about something, but he turns his head to look at her.

“I know you’re thinking about it, aren’t you?” Tikki says.

“…Yes?”

”And while we’re still here, you could.”

And that’s how she ends up joining the concert design committee and asking Adrien to write her name down (in his handwriting no less) in one fell swoop. Life is awesome.

When she looks back at the corridor, Vera and Blaise are gone. She sends a message along to Chat before she heads to the gate, praying that her good luck holds and she won’t run into anybody she knows along the way.

Unfortunately, now that she’s thought about it, she’s just jinxed it.

“ _Alya?_ ” She manages to stop herself in time before she sends her best friend falling down the stairs. “I thought you had a club meeting!”

“Wow, nice to see you too,” Alya says, but thankfully there’s no real bite behind it. “Our president had to postpone. Her family’s apartment is near the Seine, and something’s going on down there—I think something about giant fish? So here I am, and—“ She loops an arm around Marinette’s. “Where are you going?”

“Um.” She’s trapped. Doubling back again won’t pass with an excuse, and if Marinette says she’s going to the Seine, Alya’s going to go with her. But Alya is going there regardless, if the gleam in her eyes is any indication.

“And of course Ladybug’s going to show up, so I need to update my Ladyblog.” Alya waves her phone. “You coming?”

“Er—“ Marinette makes a series of rather vague hand gestures, wishing Alya would magically drop the subject and at the same time, resigned to the eventual dodging she’ll have to do.

Alya takes it as a yes anyway.

* * *

This is a first. Of course, every akuma they’ve encountered so far is a first, but Adrien just likes to give it that sort of weight because from his perch on the rooftop, it looks just utterly ridiculous. Maybe not as ridiculous as Monsieur Pigeon, but nothing tops that yet.

A goldfish—a giant goldfish about the size of his house is parading down the Seine to the Pont des Arts, and he can see its giant mouth opening and closing since it’s only half submerged in the water like a toy submarine. A kid stands proudly on top, brandishing a trident that’s taller than him.

“Fear me!” The little tyke bellows in a magnified voice. “I am the Sea King!”

Fine, it’s a bit cute.

But the people scampering away from the banks may not think so, what with the river overflowing and all. He leaps down on top of the goldfish.

“Aren’t you too young to be roaming Paris without your parents? You probably should go back to school,” he says, raising his staff.

It has occurred to him that maybe, taunting supervillains fueled by negative emotions isn’t usually the wisest course of action without backup, but his mouth tends to run away from him when he’s Chat Noir. Sea King scrunches up his face like he’s about to cry, and Adrien’s ready to dodge an attack, only that he nearly misses the fish.

A pike that’s definitely bigger than him leaps out of the water to his right. He swats it away with his staff, but another follows it, and this time, he notices it trying to attack his right arm in particular. His Miraculous Stone then? The second one he punts right out onto the banks. He rushes closer to the kid, thinking to disarm him—he’ll bet his secret stash of sweets that trident is where the akuma is—but the giant goldfish starts to buck underneath him, and he staggers.

“ _Stop hurting the fish!_ ” Sea King yells, and the goldfish manages to shake him off into the water.

Up until that point, he never knew salmon could look so angry.

He has to frantically swim away from all the angry fish waiting for him underwater, but when he surfaces, what he sees makes him think about finding a nice sturdy umbrella. Because he’s very familiar with the saying ‘raining cats and dogs’, only this time, when he looks up, a fish lands on his face.

“You can’t be serious,” he mutters under his breath, rubbing his stinging nose as he climbs onto the bank in time for him to witness the giant goldfish smashing into the Pont des Arts. And he’s pretty sure the goldfish just gobbled it up.

He should follow Sea King down the river, but with the water overflowing and the larger than usual fish raining down and attacking civilians in a weird reversal of the food chain, he has to stay and help. At least most of the fish land just until where the water has reached already, so he punts them off the screaming people—“Sorry!” he yells back at the people—and back into the water.

As for the fish that don’t fall under the ‘most’—

He sees a dark shape underneath the river, and he only has a split second’s warning before a catfish bigger than a school bus leaps out of the water, clearing the air over his head, and heading towards two figures at the corner of his eye. Without hesitation, he activates Cataclysm, jumping after the fish with the power of raw destruction in his palm, and he hopes that even with his fantastically bad luck, he won’t miss.

He doesn’t.

The giant catfish rots into skin, bones, and dust in the blink of an eye. The scene clears and reveals Marinette in front of Alya, seeming to want to shield her friend from murderous catfish—and wait, why are they even here in the first place?

So he asks, “What are you doing here?”

Now that he notices, Alya has been holding her phone in front of her. “That was actually cool! Also, I’m a journalist, remember? I just didn’t expect the fish to be—“ She coughs. “I really did not expect the fish. Thanks for that by the way.”

“Yeah, thank you so much for that, Chat Noir. And you looked so heroic when you saved us from that fish!” Marinette gushes. The difference between the Marinette he talked to half an hour ago and the Marinette now is so striking that Adrien laughs.

Marinette frowns. “What’s funny?”

He brushes it off. “Nothing much, just this whole fishy problem I have to deal with. I’m still waiting for Ladybug, you see.”

His ring beeps in warning.

Marinette’s eyes flick to it. “I’m sure us normal people should probably stay, you know, away from the ‘fishy problem’, so—“ She pats his shoulder. “Good luck with that.” And she proceeds to dragging Alya with her to the nearby café, with Alya protesting along the way.

“Don’t I at least get a thank you kiss, Princess?” he calls out, simply because he can’t help but tease.

Marinette looks back over her shoulder. “Not this time, little kitty!”

He raises an eyebrow. Little kitty? But then his ring beeps a second time, so he decides to make the most of it and sprints toward a shop he knows sells cheese by Pont Neuf.

He just hopes Ladybug could be here soon.

* * *

The café is jam-packed with people who have decided to wait out the giant fish, and it’s perfect for her to be able to sneak out. Once Alya successfully elbows them a bit of space at the corner, Marinette excuses herself by saying she has to call her parents.

“I’ll be at the bathroom,” she says, pointing to the back and enunciating every word over the din. “I don’t think I can hear anything here.”

“Sure.” Alya gestures to the menu by the counter. “Chocolate, caramel, or strawberry?

“With that long of a line? I’ll pass.”

Alya shrugs. “Don’t steal from mine when you come back.”

“Haha. I’ll take a while.”

Marinette doesn’t enter the bathroom—the line for it extends all the way back to the counter anyway—but instead tries the employee’s entrance farther back. She lets out a sigh of relief when she finds it unlocked. It opens into an alley behind the café.

After she transforms, she takes to the rooftops because a giant goldfish can’t be that hard to spot, right? She finds it farther down the river than she expected, and as if it wasn’t enough that it already ate Pont des Arts, it seems determined to plow through Pont Neuf as well. Too bad that the fish didn’t have the decency to at least have its tail fin above water as well, or this could have been over fast.

She throws her yoyo around a streetlamp at the opposite bank and braces herself as the fish snags itself on the line. Has she ever mentioned how much she loves magical unbreakable string? It doesn’t stop her from being yanked forward by the weight, but it does stop the fish as the little kid on top looks back at her in annoyance.

There’s a pang in her chest. What made someone this young attract an akuma? Although judging from the way things have gone for the past months, she won’t be surprised now if it somehow turns out to be Chloe’s doing as well.

“Just leave me and my fish alone!” the boy shrieks, brandishing his trident at her.

“Not while you’re going around destroying Paris!” Marinette yells back, but she has to duck as a couple of fish with teeth far too sharp for her comfort leap at her from the river, one almost grazing her ear. Giant carnivorous fish being sent to try and get her Miraculous Stones? Just wonderful.

She tries another tact. “If you get down from there, I promise you can play with the fish all you want. We’ll leave you alone, and you can even play with your giant goldfish.” The last part is probably stretching it, but it couldn’t have been at that size before he got possessed by the akuma.

Sea King hesitates like he’s considering her offer, but that would have been too easy, since after a few seconds, his face flashes with a purple outline, and he screams, “ _LIAR!_ ”

When she sees the dark shape in the water, she throws herself to the side—Cataclysm would really be handy in this situation, and she hopes Chat’s about to be done recharging—but instead of whatever giant fish throwing itself at her, it leaps into the air instead, and its tail whips and catches her painfully around her middle, throwing her back and sending her crashing into something that knocks the wind right out of her.

* * *

Chat Noir

_Hey_

_I’m kind of worried since I thought you’d be at the Seine first, so this is me asking where are you now?_

_But if you’re not answering this, I’ll take it as a sign that you’re in costume._

Sent 13:08

\--

Chat Noir

_I really hope you didn’t get swallowed by the giant goldfish. That would be bad._

Sent 13:15

* * *

Marinette groans as she lifts herself up, leaning of the brick wall behind her for support. A horde of smaller fish launches itself at her, and she spins her yoyo into a shield just in time. She grits her teeth. This is really getting irritating.

“Need a paw?” A familiar voice says from above her with a faint scent of cheese. Chat Noir drops down beside her and together, they manage to deflect the fish back into the river.

Marinette grins. “I was beginning to wonder if you were ever going to show up.”

Chat snorts as he twirls his staff. “I was here defending innocent civilians half an hour ago, you know. And that’s a 4-3 in favor of meow on who shows up first.”

It’s only now that she remembers the bet they made on a rather boring night patrol. Right. “Fine. Food’s on me next time, but for now—“ She points at the kid and his goldfish who are steadily advancing on Pont Neuf. “Any ideas?”

“You probably need to break the trident. Also, the fish are annoying, and that’s coming from a cat already.”

“I know, right?” Marinette tosses her yoyo in the air for Lucky Charm, and when the glow fades, a giant canister of fish food lands in her hands.

This can’t be that hard to figure out.

“How do you feel about using Cataclysm on a giant goldfish?” she asks.

He smirks. “Honestly? A bit gill-ty.”

“Really.”

“I mean—maybe his pet goldfish died or something,” he says, but the air surrounding his hand darkens anyway.

They nod at each other before Marinette runs for the bank and Chat Noir to the bridge. She pours the whole canister into the river, and when she can see the fish underwater gobbling it up, she yells, “Go!”

Chat leaps from the bridge to the goldfish, and this time, even as Sea King tries, there no sudden torrent of fish pummeling into him. The goldfish tries splashing into the air to throw Chat off—and to anyone who hasn’t seen a giant fish the size of a giant house jumping into the air, it’s truly a sight to behold—but he holds on and scratches at it with his right hand, and the goldfish disintegrates midair.

Marinette tosses her yoyo onto a beam on the opposite bank and swings to catch Sea King before he falls into the river. “Sorry about this,” she mutters to the kid as she sets him on the ground and breaks the trident.

* * *

Adrien is really, really glad that the angry salmon aren’t angry anymore the second time he lands into the river. He pulls himself out of the water just in time for him to witness Ladybug using Healing Light, washing the world in a soft glow as everything returns back to normal. Even the flopping fish on land vanish, and he assumes they’re all back in the river.

When he gets to her, she’s standing beside a woman comforting the kid who was Sea King—and he’s even younger than what Adrien thought at first, maybe seven, but supervillainy doesn’t make anyone age well—and he’s clutching at what looks like a corpse of a dead goldfish. But a tiny smile forms on his face as his mother—he assumes—carries him away.

Ladybug holds out her fist and he bumps it with his own in return.

“Now that’s done and done, I’ll see you around,” she says.

Ladybug is always brief and to the point in her farewells to him, which granted, is probably because of the fact her transformation usually wears off soon after catching the akuma. Oh well, there’s always the semi-regular patrols, but as usual, his chest tightens a bit when he thinks, _I wish I could spend a bit more time with her._

But that sounds selfish anyway.

“See you,” he replies. “And I’m looking forward to the food, my lady.”

“Oh? Maybe I’ll just bring cheese,” she quips.

“Please don’t.”

She laughs and takes off at a run across the bridge.

He starts running too. Second afternoon period is probably starting by now, and maybe Ms. Mendelev will have mercy on him if he uses the ‘I had a photoshoot’ card? Probably not, but he can dream.

He’s climbing onto the fourth rooftop for his usual shortcut to school, and when he reaches the top, he nearly falls off when he sees Ladybug there leveling her best glare at him.

“Why are you following me?”

“I’m not!” he protests. “I hang out around this side of the Seine.”

That seems to take her aback. She chews on her lower lip, seeming to contemplate something.

At the same time, a realization dawns on his mind. “Wait. So you live around this neighborhood too?”

She scoffs. “Maybe I just like the farmer’s market here.”

“Really?” he drawls.

Her face turns red, and she throws her yoyo into another direction. “Cheese. You’ll be looking forward to cheese and catnip,” she threatens before she swings away.

It takes him a while to be aware of the wide smile on his face as he looks in her direction. He’s had this guess for a while now that Ladybug lives around his neighborhood, or at the very least, somewhere around school, given how frequently the both of them show up together at the scene. If her reaction more or less confirms that—

His ring beeping brings him out of his reverie, and he shakes his head. He’d rather not have to climb down from somewhere after his transformation wears off.

But if his hunch is right, he wonders how many times they’ve already passed by each other.

* * *

Ladybug

_‘eaten by a goldfish’???_

_wow_

_[goldfish emoji] [cat emoji]_

Sent 17:32

\--

Chat Noir

_Hey, it’s a valid concern._

_[multiple goldfish emoji] [ladybug and cat emoji skipping together]_

Sent 18:08

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since my sembreak is about to end, expect less frequent updates after this chapter. I'll continue to work on it though, worry not. I'd like to hear what you think of the story so far over at my [tumblr](http://www.pallasjoannas.tumblr.com) or in the comments, so at least I'll have something to think about in between histology classes haha.

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: What I know about gymnastics wouldn't even fill a thimble.  
> The title comes from a song of the same name by Gabrielle Aplin.  
> You can also find this fic on tumblr at pallasjoannas.


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